Health-Related Behaviors and Social Media Usage in Young Adults: Mediating Role of Coping Strategies during COVID-19 Smart Lockdown

Abstract

The study investigated the association between health-related behaviors, coping strategies and social media usage in young adults during COVID-19 smart lockdown as well as the mediating role of coping strategies between the relationships. It was hypothesized that coping strategies mediates the relationship between health-related behaviors and social media usage in young adults during COVID-19 smart lockdown. Through purposive sampling technique, data from (N=300) young adults with age range 18-35 years (M=23.67, SD= 3.78) was collected from three private universities of Lahore. For data collection, lifestyle behavior change questionnaire by Chopra et al. (2021), coping scale by Hamby et al. (2013) and social networking usage questionnaire by Savita and Liyaqat (2018) were used. For the analysis, Pearson Product Moment Correlation, Mediation analysis, independent sample t-test and Analysis of variance were used. Coping strategies significantly mediated between health-related behaviors and social media usage in young adults during COVID-19 smart lockdown. Findings have practical implications for the expansion of different strategies for other population like adolescents, old age people, teachers, parents, anddoctors, expecting to cope better with others during stressful or traumatic events.